French Airstrikes in Mali Deter Islamist Rebels

A French fighter aircraft prepared for take off at a base in Chad on Friday.Credit
Nicolas-Nelson Richard/ECPAD, via, AFP — Getty Images

PARIS — French airstrikes in Mali appeared to halt an Islamist rebel advance, France said Saturday, as West African nations authorized what they said would be a fast deployment of troops in support of the weak Malian government.

Britain also announced late on Saturday that it would help to transport foreign troops and equipment to Mali, though would not send its own soldiers to fight.

France first intervened Friday, dropping bombs and firing rockets from helicopter gunships and jet fighters after the Islamists, who already control the north of Mali, pressed southward and overran the village of Konna, which had been the de facto line of government control. French officials said the attacks had pushed the rebels back from Konna and destroyed a rebel command center, though it was unclear if Malian forces controlled the village.

The French, who had earlier said they would not intervene militarily but only help African troops, responded to an appeal by the Malian president amid fears that the rebels would try to press on to the capital. French officials said military operations were continuing, but a spokesman for the Malian Army said Konna was “very calm” on Saturday.

The spokesman, Lt. Col. Diarran Kone, said some civilians and Malian soldiers had died in the fighting in recent days. “Zero deaths is not possible,” he said. He said the rebels, whom he called “terrorists,” suffered heavy casualties, and French officials said one French pilot had died from small-arms fire.

France, the United States and other Western nations have been increasingly anxious about the Islamists’ tightening grip on the north of the country, which they said had become a haven for militants, including those with links to Al Qaeda, who threaten not only their neighbors, but also the West. On Saturday, Adm. Édouard Guillaud, the chief of staff of the French armed forces, said that France had no plans to extend operations to those northern areas, but would expect to help African troops do the job when they arrive.

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France said its airstrikes had driven rebels out of Konna.Credit
The New York Times

“The quicker the African mission is on the ground, the less we will need to help the Malian Army,” Admiral Guillaud said. He said that more military planes had been sent to Africa for possible use in Mali, and that Rafale fighter jets could strike from France. The French defense minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, also said that special forces had been sent before the airstrikes to Mopti, a city near Konna that the Mali government says it cannot lose.

The French president, François Hollande, said that the current mission — named Serval, after an African wildcat — would last “as long as necessary,” but stressed that it was limited to “preparing for the deployment of an African intervention force.”

The statements appeared to indicate that once Malian and other African troops were in position to carry the fight to the north, France would like to return to its pledge not to use direct military force in the country. It remained unclear when such an offensive would begin.

France and the United States aim to assist African and Malian troops to restore government authority in the north by providing surveillance and intelligence, including the use of spy planes and drones, as well as by helping with logistics and the transport of troops and equipment.

French officials said they had asked Washington to speed up its contribution by sending drones to improve surveillance over the vast area held by the rebels. The French have only two such drones. The Pentagon is reported to be studying the French request.

On Saturday, Tommy Vietor, a spokesman for the National Security Council, said the United States was “monitoring the situation closely.” The United Nations Security Council had earlier agreed that troops from the 15-nation regional bloc known as Ecowas, the Economic Community of West African States, and European Union trainers for the Malian Army would help the fragile government in the capital, Bamako, win back the north of the country, where the Islamists have set up harsh rule under Shariah law in the nine months since the army fled the area. But both groups had been slow to deploy.

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In a photograph released by the French Army, French air force officers briefed at a military base in Chad on Saturday.Credit
Nicolas-Nelson Richard/ECPAD, via, Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

With the sudden movement of the Islamist fighters south, the Ecowas commission president, Kadré Désiré Ouédraogo, said Saturday that the group had authorized an immediate deployment of troops “in light of the urgency of the situation,” according to news reports. He did not specify how many troops would be sent to Mali. Most of the Ecowas troops are expected to come from Nigeria, Niger, Senegal and Togo.

“By Monday by the latest, the troops will be there or will have started to arrive,” said Ali Coulibaly, Ivory Coast’s African integration minister.

On Saturday, Gen. Carter F. Ham, the head of the Pentagon’s Africa Command, who has been visiting neighboring Niger, said, “My sense is that both A.Q.I.M. and the Malian armed forces are evaluating next steps right now.” He was using the acronym for Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, the terrorist organization’s North African arm.An official in Gao, one of the principal cities held by the Islamists, appeared to support the Malian Army’s statements about rebel casualties. “The hospital at Gao is overflowing,” said the official, who does not support the rebels. “Both morgues in the city are filled with bodies.”

Reuters quoted a resident of Gao saying scores of rebel fighters were retreating north in pickup trucks on Saturday.

A spokesman for Ansar Dine, an Islamist group, told The Associated Press that he could not confirm if the group’s fighters were still in Konna because he had been unable to phone them. The spokesman, Sanda Ould Boumama, told Reuters that French intervention in Mali would have “consequences, not only for French hostages, but also for all French citizens wherever they find themselves in the Muslim world.”

Fear of those consequences, at least for several French hostages held in North Africa, may have been a motivation for a failed French rescue mission early on Saturday in Somalia in which Mr. Hollande said the hostage died. He also said that he had asked for increased security at government buildings and public spaces in France to thwart terrorists.

Mr. Le Drian said that France needed to act in Mali to forestall the collapse of the government. “The threat is the establishment of a terrorist state within range of Europe and of France,” he said. Hundreds of French troops have been moved to Bamako to protect French citizens there.

A version of this article appears in print on January 13, 2013, on page A8 of the New York edition with the headline: French Airstrikes in Mali Deter Islamist Rebels. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe